It’s also written in Mono, letting it run across multiple different platforms. While its mainly targeted towards Windows, it also means both macOS and Linux are supported by it. Though it might not look very native, it works just fine. Plus, having your passwords accessible is benefit enough.

Wine + Mono = Better Compatibility

Mono can also aid Windows switchers by way of extending WineHow to Run Windows Apps & Games with Linux WineHow to Run Windows Apps & Games with Linux WineIs there any way to get Windows software working on Linux? One answer is to use Wine, but while it can be very useful, it probably should only be your last resort. Here's why.Read More, a compatibility layer to let users run Windows applications. Wine reverse engineers a lot of Windows functionality, and translates that behavior into their Linux equivalents. As such, it can run many programs not designed for Linux, as if they were.

The actual Mono installation file contains a number of software libraries, components that other programs can build off of. They’re designed to implement as much of the .NET Framework as they can (albeit cross-platform). Because of this, a lot of things written for Windows using said framework will work under Mono as well.

Mono in an Open Source .NET World

As mentioned previously, much of the .NET framework is now open source, with more to come. Already, it’s possible to (somewhat) take advantage of it on platforms other than Windows. One then, might wonder how Mono might still be useful for people.

The answer to that is quite simple: a lot of the usable components of .NET are invisible to end users. It’s still quite difficult to build cross platform graphical applications using only Microsoft’s now open source framework. Mono on the other hand, is well established, having multiple ways to write native looking programs, with little hassle. And it will only continue to grow,

Of course, when the open source components of .NET become more established, it will have gained many of the benefits that Mono currently provides. And that can only be a good thing for Linux, as well as for users who might want to switch to it. More portable applications are always welcome, after all.